Drinking Doesn't Solve Anything
by frostykitten
Summary: Hermione learns the hard way that alcohol is a horrible coping mechanism when she wakes up in none other than Draco Malfoy's house after a night of drinking. Now she's stuck on his private island and has to figure out a way home - and how she got there.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I wanted to try something from the first person perspective, and had this idea in the back of my head since I hit it just now... I've read several fanfictions that have Draco showing up at Hermione's house needing help, but less that she shows up at his. **

I knew the second I had the first drink that I was going to end up doing something monumentally stupid by the end of the night. I thought I might end up falling down some stairs and chipping a tooth, or throwing up a kidney. My worst case scenario was passing out at the bar and waking up when they threw me out on the street. What actually happened was worse. Much _much_ worse.

* * *

I'm pretty sure it was my head that woke me up. It was putting so much work into hurting and I wasn't even awake to appreciate the excruciating pain, which must have made it angry, so it hurt even more out of spite.

"Owwwww," I groaned as I struggled to sit up. I gave that up pretty quick – it hurt too much. Staying in bed until someone found me or I died seemed like the best plan at the moment. If only the sun streaming in the giant windows would go away.

I glared at the offending windows. Who even needed windows that big? They were floor to ceiling and taking up almost the whole wall. Wait a minute... Where had I ever been with windows like that? Come to think of it – where was I?

I sat up quickly and looked around, trying to remember where I was. I held my head as it got impatient that I wasn't paying enough attention to it again.

Okay. First I needed to get to the windows and look outside to try and figure out where I was, then I needed a hangover potion – really bad. I made a valiant attempt to get up, but was foiled again when whatever I had drank last night tried to escape. I fell back down to the pillows and pulled a blanket over my head – maybe if I ignored everything, it would all go away and I'd wake up in my own bed where I belonged.

"I see you're up. Would you care to explain why you were banging on my door in the middle of the night, completely drunk," asked a voice I couldn't see the owner of because I was still hiding under the covers. It was a nice voice; it was deep pitched, so it didn't hurt my head, it was also oddly familiar, but I couldn't seem to place it. "Granger, I know you're up, I heard your groaning," the voice said again, followed by a hand shaking me.

"Go 'way," I whined at it, not capable of full sentences at the moment. It was an annoyingly persistent voice.

"If you get out of the bed, I'll give you the hangover potion I have here." An annoyingly persistent voice that was my new best friend. I hesitantly pulled back the covers and peeked out at the person looming over me.

"Malfoy?" I asked in disbelief, staring at the blond standing over me. My head hurt way too much to process why he was in my room - well... the room that I was currently staying in.

All right, I could deal with this. My childhood nemesis just turned up midway through the worst hangover of my life. Why had I even drunk that much last night? I never did anything like that...

That's when it hit me like a ton of bricks; I'd been drinking last night because of Ron, my so called husband. Six months! It took him six months of marriage before he cheated on me! I was angry and depressed all over again as I remembered the events of last night.

"_Hermione, wait!" Ron shouted after me as I ran from the sight of him and another woman on the couch in our home. "Hermione, don't be a coward about this! We need to talk."_

_That one stopped me. Furious, I turned around to face him. "Listen to me Ronald Weasley, I will not be that wife who sits at home while her husband is out with other women and pretends nothing is wrong!" I poked him in the chest a few times to prove my point._

"_Hermione, we're not working out and we both know it," he tried, reaching as if to hug me._

"_Don't touch me!" I yelled as I jumped out of his reach. "No, you knew it; I never got the message apparently!" Now the tears were starting, I could feel them. I had been under the impression we were having a bit of a rough patch, not that we were over and both in denial like my husband had apparently been thinking._

"_Don't cry, you knew this was coming."_

_I stared at him in disbelief. "I did NOT know this was coming! I thought if you were having doubts about us you'd try talking to me about this first, not cheating on me with the first slag that'll hop into bed with you!" I yelled, jumping out of his reach again as he took a step towards me. I gave him one last hurt look before I apparated away to the nearest bar._

Malfoy was backing away from me with a horrified expression. "You're not going to start _crying_ are you?" I shook my head, sniffing and wiping the tears that had started to form in my eyes. He looked very relieved. "Good. I got enough of your whining last night."

"Why am I even here?" I asked; confused as to how the bar I had been in turned into Malfoy's house. I thought about it for a second, wondering if I even knew where Malfoy lived, I had a vague recollection of an article in The Daily Prophet that said something about him disappearing, and was pretty sure it was just his parents that were living in the manor, so where was I?

"You're in this room because you were banging on my door in the middle of the night and it was easier to put you in a spare bedroom than it was to shove you out the door – you kept grabbing on to the doorframe when I tried."

"Is this your house?" I wasn't surprised that he had tried to shove me back out the door; we weren't exactly close or anything, I probably would have done the same if the situation had been reversed.

He rolled his eyes at me. "Of _course_ this is my house Granger. What I want to know is how you found it."

I tilted my head at him, immediately regretting it as it started to pound again. I asked my question with my face in my hands, trying to stifle the ache. "What do you mean?"

"I _mean_ that the bar you were drinking at was somewhere in London, right?" I nodded; of course I was drinking in London. "Well, you're not in London anymore; you're on a private island in the middle of the ocean."

I was way too hung-over for this crap, instead of answering; I leaned over the edge of the bed and threw up. "Owww," I groaned, the motion of leaning over had hurt my head.

Malfoy looked disgusted. "Granger, I'm only giving you this so you don't throw up on my floor again, not because I care that you're feeling sick." He clarified as he handed me a hangover potion he pulled out of his pocket.

I took it gratefully and gulped it down; sighing in relief as my headache disappeared, taking all my other symptoms with it. Good riddance, now I could think. I vanished the mess I had made on the floor, and thought about what he had said.

"I'm... where?"

"In the middle of the ocean on a private island, thousands of kilometres away from anyone you know. There's no way you've been here before, so how the hell did you manage to apparate to my front door?"

I frowned... So I was literally trapped on a deserted island with Draco Malfoy? Nope, not thinking about that yet, maybe when I got home I'd ponder it. "So how do I get home?"

He gave me a look like I was a moron. "You don't. I'm here under house arrest, no one can apparate out and they shouldn't be able to apparate in."

Great, I was stuck here.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed! This one's even shorter than the first one, but I needed to stop it there.**

**Disclaimer: I forgot to write one last chapter, but that one's not mine any more than this one is.**

_Last chapter:_

_He gave me a look like I was a moron. "You don't. I'm here under house arrest, no one can apparate out and they shouldn't be able to apparate in."_

_Great, I was stuck here._

_

* * *

_"Wait, under house arrest? I thought you were missing?" I asked; picking up on some of the other things he had said a little belatedly; I had been preoccupied with the fact that I was trapped.

He sighed and rolled his eyes like the answer was the most obvious thing in the world. "Granger, when your family has as much money and political influence as mine does, things like an arrest in the family can't become public knowledge. I expect I'll 'turn up' in two years when my sentence is up," he told me with a sneer.

I was annoyed all over again that his family had managed to stay out of Azkaban after the war. Malfoy had been on the side of the Order for a surprisingly large portion of the war, and his mother had never really sided with Voldemort in the first place. Lucius Malfoy, on the other hand, had noticed that he was on the losing side and changed at the last battle, allowing him to get away with only a slap on the wrist, to the frustration to most of the entire wizarding world.

"What are you under house arrest _for_? I thought you were pardoned for your actions during the war," I asked him.

His expression darkened at the mention of why he was trapped here. "I was framed. Leave it at that."

Surprisingly enough, I believed him. I'd worked with him briefly during the war, and he had actually been civil – as civil as a Malfoy was capable of being when the one he was addressing was a muggle born.

"Now it's my turn for the questions. What in the world were you doing that drunk on a Monday night?"

I blushed and looked down at the covers, I really didn't want to tell _him_ of all people what had happened, he would probably laugh at me. "Come on Granger, I answered you, it would be polite to return the favour."

I sighed; I showed up at his door in the middle of the night, I at least owed him an answer. "Ron's been cheating on me; I left him and went drinking." I cringed as I waited for the laughing.

When I glanced up at him he was contemplating me. He eventually shrugged. "I've been drunk for worse reasons." He turned and walked to the doorway, glancing back at me when he noticed I wasn't behind him.

"I'm going to get some breakfast, are you coming?" I nodded and wordlessly moved to follow him out of the room.

As I got out from under the covers for the first time that day without a blinding headache to distract me, I noticed that I wasn't wearing the clothes I had showed up here in. "MALFOY! Who changed my clothes?" I screeched, tugging on the skimpy nightgown someone had put me in.

My only answer was him chuckling from down the stairs, making me even more nervous. "Malfoy! Who changed my clothes?" I asked again, my voice rising in pitch as I got more and more distraught. I tore out of the room after him, only to collide with his chest a second later as I turned the corner.

He laughed as he steadied me. "Relax Granger, house elves can change your clothes with a snap of their fingers, remember? Magic? I'm sure even _you_ are familiar with it." He drawled at me.

I wasn't listening; I was remembering something for the previous night.

_I was sitting at the bar, nursing what must have been my third, or fourth drink, when someone came up behind me. "Hermione Granger, you shouldn't be here," the person warned, causing me to turn and glance up at them. _

"_Gregory Goyle," I was surprised that he was here talking to me. I was surprised he could form complete sentences period – he didn't exactly come off as very smart while we were in school. "What do you mean I shouldn't be here? I have just as much of a right as everyone else here!" I was starting to get angry – just because he was a pureblood didn't mean that he could decided that I couldn't be here._

_He sat down beside me, looking confused. "I mean you shouldn't be here because you're perfect for the plan. You should leave before you're seen." He glanced around anxiously as he told me this, as if he expected someone to overhear. _

_I glanced around as well, but didn't see anyone suspicious, so I turned back to my drink. I was hopeful that he'd get bored of this strange harassment and leave me to drown my sorrows. _

_I should have known nothing would go my way. He ordered something and proceeded to drink it as he sat beside me. I frowned, it's not like we were friends or even acquaintances really. "Are you going to tell me what this plan is?" I eventually asked, realizing that he wasn't going to leave, so I might as well find out what in the world this 'plan' was. _

"_I can't, it's not my plan." He told me, actually looking genuinely sad. I assumed his sadness was because he wasn't capable of thinking up his own plan, not real remorse that he couldn't tell me what this plan was about. _

_He suddenly glanced behind me at something and then paled. "You should be careful tonight; you might end up somewhere you shouldn't be" He told me as he hurriedly paid the bartender and then left the bar without looking back. I watched him go, wondering that the heck that was about._

"You should be careful tonight; you might end up somewhere you shouldn't be," I repeated in shock, looking up at Malfoy, who still had his hands on my shoulders from when he steadied me.

"What are you on about Granger?" He asked, letting go and taking a step back once he saw that I was fully present again.

"Gregory Goyle," I told him, only getting a confused look. "He knew someone was going to send me here."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

**A/N: It's getting bigger... I think I might just be incapable of writing something nice and short and simple. I have the plot all done... I was done it earlier, but I decided it wasn't complicated enough... Hence the story getting bigger. Thanks to everyone who reviewed, etc. etc.! **

**~ Frosty**

**Disclaimer:**

_Last Chapter:_

"_What are you on about Granger?" He asked, letting go and taking a step back once he saw that I was fully present again._

"_Gregory Goyle," I told him, only getting a confused look. "He knew someone was going to send me here."_

_

* * *

_Malfoy raised his eyebrow, only saying "Explain, but over breakfast, before I starve to death."

I rolled my eyes, he was being over dramatic, but I obligingly told him the whole story – the bits I could remember anyway.

"So, let me get this straight; Greg shows up in the bar you're drinking at to give you a warning about a plan he refused to tell you anything about." I nodded, it sounded a bit crazier when he put it that way. He gave me a skeptical look but seemed to think about it anyway.

"I'm not sure this was about you," he said thoughtfully. "I think it might be about me."

I rolled my eyes at that; he brought conceit to a whole new level. He noticed my eye roll.

"No, think about it Granger. He told you 'you're perfect for the plan'. If you're going to come up with a plan, you usually have a target first and _then_ come up with something. They only reason you'd need someone else is if you needed a pawn to help you, it would be someone disposable."

I glared at him. I got what he was trying to say, but he could have phrased it in a way that didn't make it sound like I was the faceless pawn, while he was the focal point of the plan, the target. I finished the eggs the house elf had brought me before I answered.

"All right, who have you pissed off enough to make them plot against you?"

He gave me a disbelieving look. "Well, everyone on the losing side of the battle is out to kill me because I betrayed them, and a large portion of the winning side is out to get me because I was on the wrong side for the first bit of the war." I sighed, he was right; it would be difficult to figure out who did it that way.

"And then there's all those women..." I trailed off, he knew what I meant; he was a bit of a man whore before he disappeared.

He nodded. "And their husbands," I rolled my eyes, of _course_ some of them were married. I was beginning to think the list of people who _didn't_ want to plot against him was shorter than one list of people who _did_.

"What would someone accomplish by sending me here?" I wondered out loud. Maybe it was some sort of plot to hurt Harry? But most of the Death Eaters had been rounded up and thrown into Azkaban.

"Granger, don't you do something top secret for the ministry?" I looked up sharply at him, realization dawning on me.

"I'm an Unspeakable, I work with the Aurors on top secret cases. Do you think someone would want me out of the way for that?"

"That's definitely a possibility. What were you working on?" I gave him a disbelieving look. Was he serious? The job title was _Unspeakable_, I was forbidden to ever _speak_ about anything I did at work. The case I had been working on was an important one, going all the way up to the assistant to the Minister. Someone was taking funds from the Ministry and putting them to use elsewhere. My job was to find out where the heck those funds had been going.

"Earth to Granger," Malfoy said, snapping me out of my thoughts. He obviously couldn't bear that I wasn't paying any attention to him for a few seconds; he must have been going insane by himself on this island with no one to pay attention to him.

"I resent that," He said, pouting. I started and looked at him in confusion, I hadn't said anything.

"You were using legilimency on me!" The jerk! Invading my mind like that. I snapped my mental walls back up so hard he visibly flinched. One advantage of being an unspeakable was that occulmency was in the job description, and we got very good at it.

"That _hurt_ Granger," he whined. I glared at him, if he was going to invade my mind, then I had every right to do that and more.

"What else did you find while you were in my head?" I demanded – there were things in my head that no one should know, things about work and things about my personal life.

Malfoy scowled. "Some really disturbing things," he told me while he shuddered. "You and Weasley were disgustingly happy there in the beginning, what went wrong towards the end?"

I frowned as I remembered the night everything started to fall apart.

_Today was our one month anniversary and I was excited to spend it with my husband. I got off work early so I had time to prepare a huge dinner for the both of us. I'd known that one whole month of marriage was no great accomplishment, but after the war that we had all suffered through, we deserved to be able to celebrate the normal, happy things. _

_First month of marriage had seemed like one of the most normal and happy things I could think of, so a small celebration was what we were going to have. Everything was all set out, I had even gone to get Ron's favourite sweets for after dinner – he'd had to cut down on the sweets once he'd gone to work for his father in the __Office for the Detection and Confiscation of Counterfeit Defensive Spells and Protective Objects__, all the desk work he had been doing wasn't near as much exercise as saving the world had been._

_All that was missing from my celebration was Ron – what kind of anniversary (even if it was only one month) was celebrated alone? Ron knew I was doing this, he had told me he'd thought it was a brilliant idea, and that he would be there._

_I was optimistic that he was just running late for the first hour, but as they wore on, I got less and less hopeful that he had just been held up at work. He had obviously forgotten about our plans, which wouldn't have upset me that much, if he had not returned home drunk, at four in the morning._

_When he finally walked in the door, Ron looked at me in confusion, obviously wondering why I was still up and waiting for him. I had fallen asleep at the table, in the dark after the candles had burned all the way down and went out. _

"_Hermione, what are you doing up?" He slurred at me. I glared and ignored him, stomping off to the bedroom and not speaking to him for the rest of the night._

I had never openly confronted Ron about it, but something had gone wrong for him that night and I had never found out what it was. I had yelled at him that I expected him to come to me with the things that were bothering him about us, but I hadn't confronted him when I knew something was wrong.

"If you're going to keep staring off into space like that, I'm going to start throwing things at you to get your attention," Malfoy threatened. He was obviously unhappy that the first human contact he'd had in who knows how long wasn't paying any attention to him.

I frowned in thought; if I couldn't figure _something_ out, then I was going to be stuck here with Malfoy until his sentence was up or someone came to check up on him. "How frequently do they check on you?"

He tilted his head, confused. "They don't. They send supplies and I have two house elves here that report to them on everything I do."

I cringed, completely cut off from everyone for years, and for something he didn't do.

"So what do you plan on doing with your first day of imprisonment Granger?" Something hit me then; Malfoy had been calling me Granger from the second I woke up. I may have had a falling out with him, but I was still married to Ron.

"Why is it that you haven't once called me by my married name?" I asked him curiously.

He gave me a look like he thought the answer was obvious. "You always were and always will be Granger, the bossy, know-it-all Gryffindor." I half smiled as he said that; it was almost comforting to know that no matter what changed with me, there was still someone who was going to think the same of me – the fact that the thinking was mostly bad wasn't really of any relevance.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

**A/N: Fourth chapter! This one's slower updating than my last one because it's less fun to write, so I write it slower. Don't worry though, it'll get finished. Eventually. Thanks to everyone who reviewed, etc, etc. **

**~Frosty**

_Last Chapter:_

_He gave me a look like he thought the answer was obvious. "You always were and always will be Granger, the bossy, know-it-all Gryffindor." I half smiled as he said that; it was almost comforting to know that no matter what changed with me, there was still someone who was going to think the same of me – the fact that the thinking was mostly bad wasn't really of any relevance. _

_

* * *

_It only took me one day stuck on an island with Malfoy to be ready to bang my head against a wall – I was hoping that if I was unconscious, he'd leave me alone. Apparently he hadn't been doing very well here by himself, starved for attention; he had been following me around, talking nonstop for _hours_, about the most inane things. I had to get out before I went insane.

I had _nothing_ to go on though, I was at a dead end in my investigation! There were too many people to count... Wait! Something occurred to me suddenly, and I was ready to hit myself for not thinking of something so obvious sooner.

"Malfoy!" I interrupted what he to be the second hour of him moaning about not being able to get his hair gel sent here. He had been going through the pros and cons of a mixture of coconut milk and toothpaste as a substitute while I ignored him and contemplated a suitable wall to start banging my head against.

He gave me a frustrated look. "Granger, if I didn't know better, I'd think you didn't _care_ about my hair."

"I don't, but it looks better the way it is now." He looked shocked, then seemed to contemplate my words for a second. I rolled my eyes; I hadn't meant to say that, it had kind of just slipped out. It was true though, it wasn't all greased back anymore and it made him look less... Slimy. I immediately regretted saying anything.

"You're right Granger, you can only improve on this greatness. I won't let the ministry's heavy handed punishments keep me down." I stared at him in disbelief; he was actually serious. I looked around the lavish sitting room we were in on the private island he inhabited – heavy handed indeed.

"In fact," he continued, causing me to groan inaudibly – I knew he was about to say something shallow and moronic. "You should be thankful that's I've graciously allowed you into my..." he wrinkled his nose in distaste, "home." To any normal person, it would be a wonderful home, but to Draco Malfoy, it was just a jail cell.

"I'm sorry, I seem to have misplaced my gratitude; it's probably hiding somewhere with your humility." I told him dryly.

"Don't be ridiculous, I never had any humility."

I glared and shook my head; he was really very good at getting me off track. I decided to ignore his humility comment – he was right anyway.

"Who knows you're here?" I asked him, getting back to my original reason for interrupting his rambling. It couldn't be very many people if everyone in the wizarding world was under the impression that he was missing.

He frowned as he thought about it carefully – at least he was capable of focusing on the important things when it was called for. "Mother and father, of course... Blaise, Pansy, Greg... And probably anyone at the ministry with high enough clearance," he listed them off on his fingers as he said them.

I grinned at him; that narrowed down the people who would have sent me here considerably. His eyes widened as he realized what I was getting at. "Pansy's was pretty angry at me..." At my questioning look, he continued, "I broke off our engagement right before they sent me here, it was arranged and I had been looking for an excuse for _ages_ to get rid of the harpy. She didn't take it well." His cringe as he said the last sentence led me to believe that it had been a major understatement.

The mention of Pansy Parkinson sparked something in the back of my mind.

"_Ignore Greg," a cool, female voice said over my shoulder. "He's just... distraught." I frowned at the person who sat beside me. Pansy Parkinson. Would these Slytherins never leave me in peace? Next Draco Malfoy would come and sit beside me and attempt to start a conversation._

_I finished my drink, quickly ordering another one; if the night so far had been any indication, then I was going to need a lot more alcohol in my system to deal with the rest. _

"_You're not going to ask why I'm here?" She asked me disbelievingly. I turned my back on her and hoped she'd go away. _

"_Fine, I wasn't going to tell you anyway," she pouted at me. I sighed and faced her; maybe if I acknowledged her she'd get bored of harassing me and go away._

"_What do you want, Parkinson?" I asked her tiredly._

"_Nothing, Granger, I just thought I'd have a drink with you." Now, had I been in my normal state of mind, this would have seemed suspicious to me, but my rational thinking was... compromised, so I just sighed and let her finish her drink beside me in silence. _

_When she got up to leave, she patted my shoulder. "Whatever it is that's bothering you, I'm sure everything could be worse." She said with a big, fake smile._

_As she walked away I was pretty sure I caught her muttering 'and it will be', but I was too happy that she was leaving to care what was going on in the past Slytherin's heads._

"Remember something else?" Malfoy was asking me when I shook my head to clear the remainder of the foggy memory. I frowned for a second, thinking how suspicious it was that I ran into two people who knew where Malfoy was on the night that someone sent me to him.

"Would Parkinson ever willingly touch someone like me?" I asked him, thinking a pureblood princess would never go out of her way to lay a hand on my shoulder without some sort of ulterior motives.

Malfoy looked confused but shook his head no. I jumped out of the chair and ran towards the room I had been staying in the night before.

I found my clothes from the previous night neatly folded at the foot of the bad. My top looked the same on first inspection, but I carefully examined the shoulder Parkinson had touched in case she had done something to it. I touched my wand to it and cast a spell that revealed the enchantments on an object.

"Granger, what in the world are you doing?" Malfoy asked from where he watched me from the doorway, he had followed me at a more leisurely pace.

I ignored him and continued to carefully examine the shirt. I turned to him and grinned triumphantly as I pulled something out of the breast pocket. It would have been simple to drop something into it from my shoulder.

It was some sort of coin on a cord, making it into a necklace. I examined it carefully and then showed it to Malfoy for him to examine. He put out his hand and I tossed it to him.

"I have no idea what this is... It looks like a cheap trinket to me," he said, and I was forced to agree. He held it out to me and I reached out to take it from him.

The second I touched it, I felt the stomach-at-my-feet sensation that I'd come to associate with a portkey.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

**A/N: I added prat to my Microsoft Word dictionary so it wouldn't give me the annoying red lines ever again... On that word. I just know that's going to come back and bite me on an essay someday when I mean to write part and put prat instead and it doesn't correct me, and then I miss it when I edit... I'm updating because Kim told me to, see Kim? I updated.**

_Last Chapter:_

"_I have no idea what this is... It looks like a cheap trinket to me," he said, and I was forced to agree. He held it out to me and I reached out to take it from him._

_The second I touched it, I felt the stomach-at-my-feet sensation that I'd come to associate with a portkey._

Ow, ow , OW! Why was it that every time I used a portkey I ended up on my butt? Actually, come to think of it, I didn't hurt near as much as I usually did after going somewhere using the evil things; it seemed I'd landed on something softer than the ground.

"Owww," something soft that sounded a lot like Malfoy. I scrambled off of him. "Where the hell are we?" He asked me as he stiffly stood up beside me.

I frowned; I had no idea where we were. "Wherever we are, that necklace Parkinson left in my shirt must have been a portkey that wouldn't work until both of us were touching it, because nothing happened when we were touching it individually." He frowned as well and seemed to think about it.

I turned and examined where it had dropped us. There were a lot of trees in the distance and we appeared to be surrounded by rolling fields of wildflowers as far as I could see. "Great, we're in the middle of nowhere," Malfoy complained from beside me. Had I not shared his sentiments, I might have objected to his pessimism, but with the luck I'd been having lately, we were probably thousands of kilometres from any civilization.

My eyes widened as something occurred to me. "You're an escaped convict now," I told him, watching the horrible realization that I was right dawn on his face.

"Great," he muttered. "Now even if we find someone who could help us, we have to avoid them because I'm a wanted _criminal_," he bitterly complained.

"Cheer up Malfoy, it could be worse, I could be Ron," we both shuddered at the thought. I was starting to wonder what I had been thinking marrying Ron in the first place, if I was able to joke about him already, then it probably said something about our relationship. Something I was in no mood to contemplate at the moment, I had other things to worry about.

"Where do we go from here?" Malfoy asked me, but I wasn't listening, I was thinking again. Why in the world would Parkinson send me to Malfoy if she had also provided the means of escape? Malfoy had said she was furious with him, so why would she free him? And why did I need to be involved? Was it her plan that Goyle was warning me I was perfect for? I didn't ask Malfoy any of my questions because I knew he had no more idea about the answers than I did.

What was important now was figuring out where in the world we were... _Then_ I could work on the why.

"Earth to Granger," Malfoy said as he waved a hand in front of my face - he really didn't take well to being ignored. "I _said_ where do we go from here?"

"Why do I have to have the answers for everything?" I demanded. Seriously, it was annoying. First Harry and Ron all the way through school, now Malfoy. It's not like I'm omnipotent!

"I don't know... You're just so... Knowledgeable?" He tried. It fell nowhere near close to appeasing me, but I had used him to soften my landing, so prat or not, I was going to let it slide. _This _time. I wasn't going to be unrealistic and think Malfoy wasn't going to manage to be annoying again between now and whenever I finally got rid of him – which was a goal that seemed to get farther and farther away with each passing catastrophe.

"Well if you're not going to come up with anything productive, I vote we walk _that_ way," he said, pointing away from the trees. I shrugged, it was as good a direction as any, so why not.

After 5 minutes of walking in silence my curiosity got the better of me, "who framed you?" I asked him. If I was going to go down as an accessory to his escape, I wanted to at least know what they were after us for.

"The auror assigned to checking up on us at the manor had some sort of scam going on at the ministry and father was in on it, so when someone got wind of it, they panicked and put the blame on me..." My eyes widened, that sounded an awful lot like the case I had been working on. I shook my head, there was no way they were the same thing, I was still looking for the culprit in my case, they would have told me if they had made an arrest.

"Did you ask for them to use Veritaserum when they questioned you?" I asked. He scowled at me.

"Of _course_ I did, but they told me they had enough evidence to convict without a confession," he told me, his tone indicating the subject was closed.

An awkward silence followed, making me wish we could apparate from here, but that was dangerous unless you knew where you were going _and_ where you were.

"You're going to need some sort of disguise," I said suddenly, an evil idea occurring to me. Malfoy looked around and gave me a skeptical look.

"And what do you propose I do that with?" I gave him an evil smile. He only had a second to look worried before I scooped up some mud from the side of the road and squashed it in his hair.

"There!" I said proudly, "Draco Malfoy would never be caught with mud in his hair; no one will recognise you now."

He stood there frozen, not seeming able to believe that I had done that. I grinned; at least I had ended the awkward silence. "My _hair_!" He yelled, snapping out of his shock and putting his hands up to his now muddy head. "Why do I need a _disguise_ when there's no one to see it but _you_! If I didn't think you might be helpful later Granger, I'd kill you for that, or at least seriously maim you." He looked like he was contemplating the maiming part, whether he needed me or not.

"You're threatening a ministry official Malfoy, if I didn't deserve it, I'd have you arrested for that," I told him, mocking his threatening tone. He cast the tergeo charm on his hair to clean it of the mud and proceeded to ignore me. I was pretty sure too much time spent in his presence was making me snap; I didn't usually do things so childish.

"Granger, look!" He suddenly said, pointing somewhere in front of us. I looked but had no idea what it was he was pointing at. I told him as much and he rolled his eyes. "You spend too much time reading, it's ruined your eyes." I chose to ignore that comment because I'd suddenly seen what he had been pointing to, there was some kind of cabin just up the road that we hadn't been able to see because we were at the bottom of a hill and it was on the other side.

"Maybe they have an owl we can use to send for help, or a fireplace we can use to floo," he said hopefully.

"Or a phone," I suggested. I got a blank look in response and decided we'd conquer that hurdle if there actually was a phone. Malfoy knocked on the door while I looked around. There were no roads or paths anywhere that I could see, and the place wasn't exactly easy to access, so this was either the residence of a muggle who liked to live like a hermit or someone more magical.

"How'd you know which direction to walk in?" I asked, suddenly remembering he'd been pretty sure this was the right direction after he found out I had no suggestions.

He shrugged, "I had a hunch."


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

**A/N:Thanks to everyone who reviewed! Special thanks to TwinsConspiracy who read the whole thing and reviewed every chapter. I know nothing about politics... So if my terminology or anything else is wrong, it's not intentional, and if it bothers you, tell me where I went wrong and I'll correct it. It's starting to speed up, I'm thinking I'll have the mystery solved and ends tied up in a few chapters.**

**On a side note, Allergies are an evil thing, and while Benadryl makes it easier to concentrate when it stops the sneezing, it starts to interfere with my concentration once the drowsyness kicks in – blinking too long can lead to naps... You know what else is evil? Ragweed. Just thought everyone should know.**

**~Frosty**

"_How'd you know which direction to walk in?" I asked, suddenly remembering he'd been pretty sure this was the right direction after he found out I had no suggestions._

_He shrugged, "I had a hunch."_

"You had a hunch?" I asked in disbelief; out of all the directions he could have chosen, he picked the one that would lead us to something useful? Doubtful.

"Fine," he told me, seeing my skeptical look. "I've been here before when I was younger, it's a cottage that Greg's grandfather used to live in before he died. I spent a summer up here with him one year, I just didn't recognise the area at first, it's been years."

"So... This property belongs to the Goyle family?" He nodded. This was making less and less sense.

I glanced around to make sure no one was around – unlikely, since we were in the middle of nowhere – and peeked in the window on the door to be positive that no one was coming to get the door before casting an Alohomora to let us in.

Malfoy followed behind me, wand out, as I went inside. The place was dusty; it was obvious that no one had been here in a long time. "Why would Parkinson want to send us _here_?" I said aloud, frustrated; I don't like not _knowing_ things.

"Who knows what goes on in her tiny, vain little mind?" I raised a disbelieving eyebrow. "What?" he asked defensively.

"You're complaining about someone being too vain?"

"There's nothing wrong with appreciating good looks, but even I know there's a limit." A limit I had yet to see, but I wasn't going to be the one to start an argument when we were almost getting along – sort of.

"Do you think the floo's still hooked up to the system?" I asked him, finding a small pot of floo powder on the mantle of the fireplace.

"Probably, throw some powder in there; if the fire turns green, it's hooked up." I scowled at him; of course I knew that. I lit a fire with my wand before pausing, where could I go with Malfoy? It would have to be someone I trusted completely; but hiding away with someone I trusted isn't what I needed to get _answers_.

"Where should we go?" I asked Malfoy.

"Blaise," he told me immediately. Blaise Zabini, second assistant to the minister; whereabouts during the war: unknown, lives in London. He was one of the ones suspected in the disappearing funds at the ministry. I didn't say as much though; maybe if Zabini thought I knew nothing about what was going on he'd say something to incriminate himself.

"You go first," I told him, handing over the floo powder. He eyed it suspiciously.

"We go together; I don't want you thinking you can run to your precious Potter and have me arrested." He told me, surprising me by grabbing me around the waist and holding on tight as he threw the powder into the fire and jumped in.

I should have been repulsed by his close proximity, but it was really rather nice. Completely necessary too, if I moved away at all, I could slip and end up in some strange, dangerous fireplace – is what I kept telling myself, not that I wasn't possibly heading to a strange, dangerous fireplace anyway.

"Draco!" Someone yelped as we tumbled out of the fireplace. "Everyone is out looking for – is that Granger?" he asked in disbelief as we untangled ourselves from the fall and stood up, both of us brushing the extra soot off of our clothes. I felt a crinkle as I went over my back pocket and pulled out a gum wrapper, how long had _that_ been there? It looked like it had been through the wash a few times, so my guess was: a while.

"Yes, yes it is. Long story..." Malfoy said to his friend, drawing my attention away from the garbage. I threw it into the fireplace and brought my full attention to the other person in the room.

"You picked a horrible time to turn up, I'm literally swamped with paperwork," he told Malfoy, indicating the origami ducks and frogs swimming amongst paper bull rushes on waves of paper that flowed across the desk; the fireplace we came out of appeared to be located in his study. I raised my eyebrows; the inside of his head must be an interesting place – but then, he was friends with Malfoy. Malfoy seemed used to this sort of oddities, so I pretended I wasn't confused.

"Minister Shacklebolt's been frantic about the funds that are missing; they were going to be put towards that fundraiser for the children of people who died during the war – just because it's been over for a while doesn't mean they're not still orphans. Then I have your escape, Granger's missing, Weasley went and blew up some muggle's car and Potter insists he didn't fill out the form to approve a portkey when I have the form and someone remembers him doing it! Do you know how much paperwork that all adds up to!" Poor Blaise, I had no idea he worked that hard; I had always assumed the assistants to the minister had it easy, answering owls and filling out the occasional form.

"Can't you ask Percy for help with all of this?" I asked. Percy was the other assistant to the minister; you'd think he'd be helping his counterpart with some of the workload. Percy had been the one to warn me about the disappearing funds, he had a gift when it came to paperwork – not the kind of gift I would want, but it seemed to work for him. I would have thought he would want to be there for every step of the investigation; right in the middle of all the bureaucratic action.

"The git took vacation time and no one's been able to reach him!" Zabini seemed to be getting more and more worked up as he went on about his workload; I made a mental note to talk to Kingsly about it the next time I saw him. Malfoy had been ripping up scrap paper to feed the origami ducks, but he walked back over to his friend and made him sit on the sofa when he heard the rising hysteria in his voice.

"Blaise, you're going to calm down, or I'm going to force feed you a dreamless sleep draught. Don't look at me like that; I know you have some here somewhere. When was the last time you slept?" He asked his friend sternly. I watched with interest; Malfoy being kind in his own warped way was... surreal.

Zabini took a few deep breaths, while Malfoy wandered out of the room and came back with a small bottle in his hand. He wordlessly tossed it to his friend who then drank the whole thing in one sip and looked immediately relaxed – must have been a calming draught.

"Can we have a normal conversation now?" Malfoy asked him.

Zabini nodded. "Thanks mate, I needed that. Now, tell me how you found Granger." He ordered.

"She sort of found me, she showed up at my house last night after seeing both Goyle and Pansy in a bar. Pansy slipped her a portkey that was keyed to both of us; it transported us to Greg's summer cottage." Malfoy explained; I was kind of glad he hadn't found it necessary to tell his friend how drunk I had been.

Zabini looked between the two of us before going over to his swamp of a desk and plucking a few of the bull rushes. "The forms Potter doesn't remember filing was an approval for a portkey to _your island_ Draco. It was requested by your mother, I suggest you go ask her." He unfolded the papers and handed them over to Malfoy, who read them over carefully.

When he was finished, he handed them to me. They were written in Harry's writing, and the signature at the bottom of the page was definitely his. That particular scribble of a signature was hard to duplicate, and the ink he used was special, it was red with flecks of gold in it – something he insisted had nothing to do with his Gryffindor past, but no one believed him. "This is Harry's all right," I confirmed.

"Is my father still out of town?" Malfoy asked his friend, obviously worried about running into the man who played a large part in his false imprisonment.

"Yes. Your mother said he should be gone until next week."

Malfoy took a breath and then nodded grimly. "I think it's time I paid a visit home then," he said with resolve written all over his face.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

**A/N: Authour's note is at the bottom this time because I didn't want to give away the chapter...**

**~Frosty**

_Last Chapter:_

_Malfoy took a breath and then nodded grimly. "I think it's time I paid a visit home then," he said with resolve written all over his face._

"You need to take a break," he ordered his friend before getting up and striding purposefully over to the fireplace. "You coming Granger?" He asked when I didn't immediately follow. I was a little hesitant about going back to the manor – I didn't exactly have good memories of the place. I closed my eyes for a second, gathering all the courage I had before walking over to where Malfoy was standing.

"Okay, let's go."

I raised an eyebrow when he opened his arms for me to step into, but I complied... It was nice, and strangely comforting to stand there in his arms – considering who the arms belonged to, you'd think I'd be disturbed. Every time I touched him it shocked me to discover that Slytherins could be _warm_ - speaking to them, you'd think they were made of ice, or marble, or something else cold and emotionless. He threw the floo powder into the fireplace and we were off again.

Miraculously, when we arrived we landed on our feet. I was prepared to step away from Malfoy, but he didn't let go.

"Granger, can I ask you something?" He asked me in a serious voice I hadn't known he was capable of – I was most familiar with his sneer and sarcasm tones. I leaned back a bit to look up into his eyes, bringing our faces so close our noses almost touched.

"'Kay," was all I managed to get out; I didn't even bother to point out he already had – I was pretty sure that hadn't been the question he'd been asking if he could ask. I really hoped he was going to say whatever it was he had to say soon, or my eyes were going to get stuck cross-eyed from looking at him when he was so close to my face.

His mouth suddenly collided with mine so violently that I stumbled back a few steps, my back hitting the wall; Malfoy didn't seem to care, and I couldn't bring myself to either at the moment. I brought my arms up around his neck as he pressed me harder against the wall, his lips smothering mine.

I flinched when he nipped my bottom lip, it wasn't a very nice thing to do, but at that point I didn't care. I pushed back against him and bit his lip in return – something I never would have done to Ron. I was done with nice – Ron had been nice and look where that had brought me. I was done with nice; it led to people walking all over you.

Malfoy broke away, looking startled and a little bit disturbed; I had a feeling that hadn't been the question he'd meant to ask either.

I brought my hands up to my flushed cheeks and looked back at him, probably more startled than he was. My initial response to things like this would be flight – death eaters are one thing, but emotions were something entirely different - but I was trapped between him and the wall.

"Umm... Malfoy?" I tried hesitantly, hoping I wasn't going to have to _ask_ him to let me go, that would just be awkward. It figured that I'd not only be there when he went through some sort of identity crisis, but I had taken a very... _active_ part in it. My guess was that what he had done was finally hitting him, and the fact that we were in the manor, the place where most of his pureblood supremacy ideas were learned, probably wasn't helping whatever adjustments that were currently going on in his head.

"Draco!" someone gasped. That managed to snap him out of his little crisis. He whipped around and strode quickly across the room to embrace his mother.

I watched with fascination – they were showing affection, it was strange. "You shouldn't be here; the ministry could be come for a raid any second now!" Narcissa warned her son.

"They're raiding us again?" He demanded angrily.

"They're looking for _you;_ someone's really upset that you're missing."

"I'll go as soon as you tell me what you did with the portkey you got Potter to sign for," Draco promised.

Narcissa glanced at the door before she answered; she looked like she was expecting them to show up and search the house any second. "I needed someone to get you out, but the ministry portkeys are closely regulated so they only get one person in and the same person out after a certain amount of time." Hermione, unnoticed by the other two in the room, was nodding along with what the woman was saying – she was completely right.

"I knew I couldn't be the one to break you out, we needed someone above reproach to do it, and I had heard of a certain war hero who was rising in the ministry who would be perfect for it, so I had Potter sign the form for me to visit you, and then I obliviated him afterwards - you know how I was always rather skilled when it came to memory charms. Then all I had to do was wait until that Granger left the house and follow her. I bribed the bartender at that hole she was drinking in to slip her a portkey, some kind of muggle candy wrapper."

I covered my eyes and sighed quietly in exasperation at that... I had found a gum wrapper at Zabini's house and thrown it out; I had destroyed the only evidence of Narcissa's involvement, and the only evidence of my innocence in this whole disaster.

A very loud gonging type sound came from somewhere deep in the house. Narcissa let go of Malfoy and looked frantically at the door. "They're here! Quick, use the floo!"

She motioned towards the fireplace and seemed to notice me for the first time – was I really that unnoticeable, or was she just very focused on Malfoy? "Miss Granger, keep him safe for me," she told me before she left the room to answer the door.

I looked at Malfoy, who seemed to be avoiding my eyes; I wasn't sure if it was because his mother had just asked me to look after him, or because of the... episode he had right before she came into the room. "Where are we going to go?" I asked him.

"I don't know Granger; do I have to think of _everything?" _ He snapped at me. I scowled at him; just because he was having issues didn't mean he needed to get snippy with me.

Fine. If he was going to be like that, then he wasn't going to get any say in where we were going. I quickly wracked my brain for safe places we could hide. Then it hit me; the last place they'd ever look for us. "Are you coming Malfoy?" I asked him as I threw the floo powder into the fire.

He scowled at me, but came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist as I stepped into the fire and called out our destination.

**A/N: If my updates slow down, don't worry! I'm not dead, just at school. I've been doing a lot of packing and such lately... Also, this chapter took longer than normal because I got stuck at the stupid kiss scene! Tell me if you have any suggestions on how to improve it... For those of you going 'why the heck did he suddenly kiss her and what was he going to ask!" It will be answered in the next chapter.**

**~Frosty**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

**A/N: You know how you make a mistake and then try so hard to not do the same thing again that you do? Sorry about the double chapter 7... This one's harder to write than my other two stories were, I think it's because I have to keep a bunch of things in mind while I do it, so it takes more work, that and it's a bit more serious.**

**~Frosty**

_Fine. If he was going to be like that, then he wasn't going to get any say in where we were going. I quickly wracked my brain for safe places we could hide. Then it hit me; the last place they'd ever look for us. "Are you coming Malfoy?" I asked him as I threw the floo powder into the fire._

_He scowled at me, but came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist as I stepped into the fire and called out our destination._

"The Ministry!" Malfoy hissed as soon as we were out of the small fireplace in my office – I wasn't surprised he could tell we were in the ministry with only the inside of one room to go on, the whole place had this... government fell to it.

"Calm down, Malfoy. No one comes all the way down here unless they're looking for me, and I'm missing so they've already checked here and know I'm not working or hiding here," I explained to him as I sat in the comfortable chair behind my desk and shuffled through the papers that had accumulated in my 'in box' in little time I'd been away from the office.

I frowned as I got to a memo from Harry.

_Hermione,_

_Ron's told me something happened between the two of you, but he won't tell me what. He blew up a car outside the muggle restaurant we met for lunch at with a burst of out-of-control magic, so I'm assuming it's not something positive. Let me know you're all right,_

_Harry_

He sent several more memos after that, sounding more and more worried until the last one that just said:

_I'm coming to find you; you'd better be all right._

_Harry_

"What's with these pictures, Granger?" Malfoy asked, picking up the framed picture of Ron on my desk from among the many I had of all my friends and family.

"I like to surround myself with my friends and family," I told him, smiling at a waving Ginny and Harry on their wedding Day. "Come to think of it, the subject of that picture is neither." I grabbed my wand and blasted the picture right out of his hand.

He shook his unharmed fingers while we both watched the picture burn. "I see someone's skipped the denial and depression stages of the breakup and moved right on to the anger phase," Malfoy said dryly as the picture smouldered on the floor.

"We don't talk about my relationship with _him_ until you tell me what in the world happened at the manor," I told him, confident that he wouldn't want to talk about it.

"I don't want to talk about it," he told me, looking away and missing my smug grin; I was right.

"What about what you were going to ask me before you kissed me?" He looked even more uncomfortable than before after I asked him that one; the answer was probably something interesting.

"I was, um..." he started. I watched as he became something I was pretty sure few people had ever seen; a visibly uncomfortable Draco Malfoy. "I was wondering if you were going to be all right being in the manor again after what... happened there," he said in a rush. My eyes were huge by the time he'd finished that sentence; even more rare than an uncomfortable Draco Malfoy, the elusive considerate Draco Malfoy. I actually hadn't been worried once I got there, I mean, sure his aunt had tortured me there, but I had been a little preoccupied thanks to him. My eyes widened and I froze as something occurred to me.

"_Please_ tell me you didn't kiss me so you didn't have to ask that question," I told him, it seemed like a Malfoy thing to do, avoid showing compassion through whatever means necessary – but I was quickly finding out there was more to him then I had initially thought, more to him than he wanted people to see.

"That, and I've been meaning to for a while now, I had a bet with myself that it would shut you up for once," he told me. That was a little hurtful, but it actually made me feel better; it made more sense that way. Now the only thing about the whole incident left to bother me was the fact that I'd kissed him back, along with the fact that I'd enjoyed it, a _lot_.

"Why don't you go do something useful and get us something to eat from the coffee room?" I suggested, needing him to leave me alone for a little while. Peace was something I had always appreciated in the past, and I wasn't getting near enough of it with Malfoy in the room – plus I had something I needed to do, and he needed to be out of my way for it to get done.

He stared at me for a second in disbelief; it seemed that he wasn't asked to go on coffee runs very frequently on his little private island with all his house elves. "You want _me_ to go fetch us coffee, like some kind of house elf?" He asked.

"I don't trust you alone in my office, there's too many things you could screw up in here," I told him. There really were a lot of things he could mess with in here, the office of an unspeakable had... Well, unspeakable things that an outsider could throw off unknowingly.

"A Malfoy does _not_ fetch coffee," he told me haughtily.

"Fine then, that Malfoy does _not_ get anything to eat," I told him, mocking his stupid haughty tone. It seemed like that was the right thing to do – apparently a hungry Malfoy had less pride than a well fed one, because he got up and left the room. "Don't open any unlabelled doors!" I shouted after him, there were rooms in this department that were best left unopened.

Finally alone, I locked the room with a spell before I jumped from my chair and threw some floo powder in the fire. "Harry!" I yelled, kneeling down and putting my head in the fire.

"Hermione?" Came the groggy voice of my friend. "I've been looking _everywhere_ for you! Where the hell have you been?" He demanded as he woke up a little more and remembered what had been happening for the last little while.

"Listen, I can't tell you where I've been or what I've been doing or you'd have to arrest me, but I'm fine, okay?" It wasn't fair for me to run around with Malfoy while Harry searched for me and worried himself sick. Harry looked a little confused, but immensely relieved that I was fine.

"Hermione, what's going on?" He asked.

"Ron was cheating on me; it seems that we're over. Don't tell him I called, okay?" I asked, Harry nodded, still a little sleepy.

There was a banging on my office door and a muffled string of profanities coming from outside; it seemed the Malfoy was back. I glanced anxiously in the direction of the door; if Harry knew Malfoy was out there, he'd be obligated to arrest us both, then I'd never know what in the world was going on. "I have to go Harry," I told him quickly, pulling my head out of the fire and closing the floo. I blocked my calls so that Harry wouldn't be able to follow me into the office and unlocked the door.

Malfoy stumbled in holding two coffees and a plate of doughnuts. "What the _hell_ were you doing in here?" He demanded, trying to keep the coffees from spilling as he steadied himself.

"Nothing important, I'll be back in a second. Don't. Touch. _Anything_." I ordered him; I figured if he was distracted by eating something sugary, then he wouldn't get into any mischief in the short time I would be gone – he was much like a small child in that respect, I was dreading what would happen once the sugar and caffeine kicked in, but I'd deal with that later.

On my way out, I grabbed one of the coffees and a doughnut. I quickly walked down the hall to the room where the unspeakables kept their filing cabinet – yes, just one. It was magically enlarged to hold whole buildings of forms inside it.

I tapped the top drawer for the blank forms and pulled out the one I needed before heading back to my office, hoping that it was still standing.

Malfoy looked up guiltily as I entered the room, making me immediately suspicious. I quickly looked around the room to see if I could notice anything out of place. "Where'd you go?" He asked me, probably in an attempt to distract me from the chocolate fingerprints all over the memos in my in box. It looked like he now knew all about Harry looking for me, but if he wasn't going to mention it, then I wasn't either.

I chose to ignore his question, and sat at my desk to fill out the form I had picked up. "Granger," he tried. "Graaaanger," I already knew he was capable of being very annoying, but my tolerance hadn't increased with this knowledge. "Granger, what are you doing?"

"Filling out divorce papers!" I snapped at him. I hadn't actually planned on telling him what I was doing, it wasn't any of his business really, but he had annoyed the answer out of me. It seemed that it wasn't very difficult for him to do; he just had a natural irritating aura that surrounded him. I had decided that Ron was right, we hadn't been working out in a long time, and it was best we go our separate ways, so he would get the divorce I was sure he'd been trying for with his little affair – possibly affairs.

"Good for you, Granger," he put emphasis on Granger, hinting that it was going to be officially back to Granger soon, and other people would be calling me by that name as well. I put the last touches on the form and grabbed it off the desk as I stood up.

"We have to get out of here, I flooed Harry while you were getting food, and it won't take him long to come here after he found out my floo was blocked."

The divorce papers could be handed in right to the proper department, or I could fold them into an airplane and send them like a memo – the second option wasn't as official as so was discouraged, but it was so much more fun.

"Where are we going?" Draco asked as he watched me fold my form into a paper airplane.

"I... Don't actually know," I admitted. "But we can't stay here." This being on the run thing was _hard_. No way was I going to do something like stay in a tent for months – with Harry and Ron it had been hard enough, and I _liked_ them, if I were to stay with Malfoy I would either lose my mind or kill him.

"I have an idea," he told me. Good, at least one of us did.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

**A/N: I find that I'm much more likely to be writing when I have something else to put off. In this case, I have a room full of stuff that needs to be packed because I move **_**tomorrow**_**. **

**Keeping this story in the first person and my other one in the third helps me keep them separate when I have them both open and working on them at the same time. I also write them in different colours; this one is in purple and the other one is a dark red. **

**When I started writing, I was worried I wouldn't be able to drop the formal writing I was used to from writing essays, but now I'm worried I won't be able to pick up the formal writing again when I get back to school. **

**Thanks to everyone who reviewed, favourited, etc! I don't always remember to thank you guys, but I'm always happy to get those little notification emails and then read the reviews, etc. **

**~Frosty**

"_I have an idea," he told me. Good, at least one of us did._

"What is it?" I asked, with a little bit of resignation; this adventure crap was exciting when I was 14, but it got old very fast. Why was it that I couldn't even get married and settle down properly? I was supposed to get my happily ever after and then _stay_ that way.

"I vote we go find the 'vacationing' Weasley and hex him for making Blaise overworked." I sighed; that wasn't very helpful.

"You realize that if you put him in the hospital, he's not going to be able to help Blaise?"

"Why do you always have to ruin my fun?" He complained. I rolled my eyes, if he thought things through before he hexed people, then I wouldn't have to ruin his fun, besides, I had a feeling his desire to curse Percy had more to do with his need to hit a Weasley than over concern for his friend.

An idea suddenly occurred to me. "I think I know a way we can help Blaise," I told him. I quickly wrote a letter to the minister and sent it off on its way.

"How?"

"Luna Lovegood's not doing anything right now; she sometimes works as a secretary for the Quibbler when she's not writing the articles with her father. I sent a letter to Kingsley suggesting he hire her temporarily to help Zabini with all the extra paperwork," I explained to Malfoy.

"Looney Lovegood? You've suggested Looney Lovegood to help Blaise?" He asked me in shock. I frowned at him; she wasn't that bad, she just had a different way of looking at the world.

"Zabini has a swamp in his home office, I think he can handle an assistant that's a little bit strange," I told him, earning myself a glare – he didn't argue though, so he must have agreed on some level.

I suddenly heard the sound of the doors to the elevator opening at the end of the hallway. Malfoy looked at me with wide, panicked eyes and I looked back at him with a similar expression on my face – Harry was here. I quickly locked the door and cast the strongest locking spell I knew, that would only slow him down for a few minutes though.

"Where can we go?" Malfoy asked me, sounding worried – I would be too in his position, he would be in much more trouble than I was if he were to be caught.

"Malfoy... Why are you _bouncing_?" I asked; it was really starting to annoy me while I was trying to think of something.

"You're the one who let me have caffeine," he told me like it was _my _fault he was a grown man who couldn't deal with a little coffee and doughnuts.

I was thinking fast, but I kept coming up with nothing. Where was safe for us to hide? Should we even hide? Wouldn't it be easier to clear Malfoy's name? But where would we start if we were going to try that? I yawned mid thought, it was a completely inappropriate time to realize how tired I was, but that was the way my life seemed to work.

"Don't worry about thinking of a way out of here Granger, I'm sure it'll all work out," Malfoy told me sarcastically. I scowled at him, it wasn't my fault that I hadn't slept in a while, and why was I in charge of finding the safe place to go anyway? I was too tired to think properly at the moment. I made a quick decision and threw the floo powder in the fireplace. "Where are we going?" Malfoy asked.

I rolled my eyes. "Just shut up and hold on," I ordered him as I got us in the fireplace.

We came out in the living room of Harry and Ginny's house, Ginny was in bed and Harry was at the ministry looking for us. I ran outside, still dragging Malfoy behind me. "Were we just in _Potter's house_?" He demanded, he probably noticed the pictures on the wall of Harry and Ginny. Apparating out of the ministry was impossible, so we had to go somewhere where there were no protective spells.

I didn't answer, but I must have made a face because he continued, "Are you _insane_?" he was yelling at me when we finally got outside of the protective wards Harry had around his house. I ignored him, grabbing his arm and disapparating, bringing him with me.

"Some _warning_ would have been nice, Granger," he complained when we popped into appearance in a back alley somewhere in muggle London. I didn't answer him, my caffeine was wearing off and I needed to find some place to sleep.

"Where are we going?" he asked me doubtfully as he shut his mouth for a second and had a chance to look around the alleyway we were standing in.

"Somewhere to sleep," I said tiredly as I led the way out of the alley.

"Granger... Are we in a _muggle_ neighbourhood?" He asked me, sounding a little disturbed.

"Was it the cars that tipped you off?" I asked him dryly as I continued to walk briskly towards our destination – it was bound to freak him out more than cars.

"What is a... Motel?" he asked me, reading the faded sign when we finally got there. The place was a cheap one, and it was a little run down, but I had stayed here before and it was threadbare but clean. It was also sure to disturb Malfoy, and if I was going to stay in a motel, scaring Malfoy was a _huge_ plus.

The flickering sign in the window of the front office advertised a vacancy in an eye searing orange neon light; Malfoy was transfixed on it with a look of horror as we approached the door. A ding alerted the half asleep clerk of our presence and made Malfoy jump, he looked terrified of the puke green chairs and fake plant someone had set out in some sad attempt to make the tiny office appear to be a hotel lobby. "We'd like two rooms please," I politely asked the surly looking teenager.

He scowled up at me over the top of the paperback he had been reading. "We only have one room vacant," he said, like I should have known that and I was wasting his precious time here. Of _course _they only had one room available. I glanced over at Malfoy, but he wasn't there, he had gone back outside where he was resolutely looking up at the stars, I was pretty sure he was trying to go to his happy place, where he had an army of servants waiting on him and 'motel' wasn't even in his vocabulary.

"Does this one room have two beds?" I asked hopefully, maybe not everything in my life would be against me today.

"No, just the one. Do you want it or not?" He demanded impatiently. I sighed, resigned to my fate; I was too tired to find somewhere else at the moment. Besides, the universe hated me today, so there would most likely only be a _honeymoon_ suite available everywhere else. I was quickly becoming a pessimist.

"I'll take it," I told him with a cringe; Malfoy wasn't going to like this any more than I did.

I finished up with the paying and such – we were both lucky that I'd had enough cash in my wallet, I wasn't sure if the ministry had ever had the need to trace a credit card, but Harry might try it if he got desperate enough - and went outside to find Malfoy.

"We're going to have to share a room, they only had one left," I told him as I approached him.

"Only one bed?" He asked me in a resigned way. I nodded; at least the pessimism was spreading. "Let's go then," he told me, walking in the wrong direction.

I grabbed the back of his collar and pulled him behind me. "I just paid for a room, and I'm sleeping in it! You can have the bathtub," I told him as I dragged him.

I entered the room happily; glad to have somewhere soft to sleep. Malfoy entered the room hesitantly with his wand out, like the fake plant in the corner was going to eat him or something. I watched as he cast a scourgify on the entire room and was _still_ hesitant to touch anything.

"If you're such a clean freak, how did you manage to live in a dormitory for so long?" I asked him as he cautiously entered the attached bathroom. He ignored me, closing the door and having a shower – I was willing to bet he'd scourgified _that_ room twice.

I was too tired to even shower, I just took off my jeans, turned out the light and crawled into the bed, falling asleep the second my head hit the pillow.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

**A/N: I'm all moved in and unpacked now! It's all very exciting... Well, until classes start up on Monday, then it's just school. Thanks to everyone who reviewed! This one is a teeny bit shorter than some of the previous chapters, but this was a good place to stop it, so I did. **

**If the spacing of this chapter seems a little bit strange, it's Microsoft word's fault, it hates me today.**

**Also, ****twenty bucks to VladdieChica, I'm pretty sure almost everyone saw it coming, but the clichés are just so much **_**fun**_**.**

**Frosty**

"Granger, I can't sleep in the bathtub, it's a shower stall in there," I rolled over and ignored him, maybe he'd go away.

"_Granger_," he tried again. Stupid persistent annoyance.

"Sleep on the floor," I muttered without opening my eyes. I grabbed the second pillow beside me and threw it in the general direction of the irritation.

"Granger, I'm being a gentleman and not kicking you out of the bed and taking it for myself like I should be doing, now move over and let me sleep in the bed," he ordered. I was too tired to argue, I figured if he got what he wanted, then he would shut up and let me sleep. I could always do something to mess with him tomorrow as revenge for my moment of kindness, just so he'd know I wasn't going soft, but I was pretty sure making him sleep in a motel in the muggle world was messing with his mind quite a bit already – I mean, he hadn't even insulted me in a while. Maybe he was possessed.

I went back to sleep, and spent the night dreaming of blond aliens sent to our world to learn our ways and then make us feel inferior by telling us how much better their ways were than ours.

Hot. Was the first thing that registered in my mind when I started to wake up. Way too hot. I tried to kick off the blankets, but something was holding them down on one side. I pulled harder and flailed at them. Ron was usually warmer than I am and would throw the blankets off long before I was ever uncomfortable, usually leading to me freezing my butt off while he was comfortable.

"Stop wiggling around," a sleepy voice told me as an arm was slung around my waist in what was presumably an attempt to keep me still. I stilled in shock for a second, now that definitely wasn't Ron.

The shock woke me up enough to remember the events of the past few days. A wave of anger hit me as I remembered Ron again, who did he think he was? Those divorce papers couldn't go through soon enough.

Along with the knowledge about what had happened with Ron came the knowledge that it was just Malfoy behind me – this actually comforted me for some strange reason. I fought a little more until I'd escaped from under the comforter and then went back to sleep, finally the right temperature.

The second time I woke up, I was alone in the bed. "Granger, I don't know how it found us here, but there's an owl here for you," Malfoy told me.

I frowned, there were a few owls that could find someone wherever they were, but they were a very rare breed, only a few left in the entire world, one of which belonged to the minister.

I took the surprisingly unopened letter from Malfoy, raising an eyebrow when I saw the intact seal.

He shrugged. "I tried, but it's been spelled to burn anyone other than the person it was intended for." I snickered a little at that, a Malfoy who didn't try stupid things like reading my personal mail might have been worrying.

The letter _was_ from the minister, and it contained some disturbing news. I looked up at Malfoy, "Minister Shacklebolt says that Percy isn't on vacation, he's just been skipping out on work." That was a sentence I never thought I'd say, Percy skipping work was a foreign concept even to my knowledgeable brain.

Malfoy looked happier than I'd seen him in a while. "Then I really do get to hex the Weasley," he said with satisfaction. Then he frowned, "He must have lied about it to Blaise and Blaise never bothered to double check it. I've always _told_ him he was too trusting to be a good Slytherin!"

I was thinking fast, I had thought it odd that Percy took a vacation when he had been the one to report the disappearing funds; now that I knew he was skipping work, it was just downright suspicious. "well, we know where we're going next," I told Malfoy.

Where'd you get this breakfast? I asked him, finally noticing the pancakes spread across the tiny table the room had come with – as far as I knew, there was no room service or anything here.

"I threatened the worm behind the reception desk and he had someone bring it to the room," he said like this was an everyday occurrence. Lovely, now we had to get out of here in a hurry before the 'worm' called the police. The poor guy must have gone out and got something to go before coming back here and delivering it to the room; I was a little curious about what Malfoy had said to him to make him do anything, but it was best not to know in the event that we were arrested.

"We have to find Percy and get to the bottom of this fake vacation thing," I mused aloud.

Malfoy shoved the rest of his pancake in his mouth and held out his arm, chewing furiously. "What are you doing?" I asked wearily as I snatched a pancake of my own.

He swallowed the lump of food in his mouth before speaking – something Ron had never bothered doing. "I know where he is, now take my arm, we'll apparate," he informed me.

I followed his example and shoved the rest of my pancake in my mouth before taking his arm. I was a little hesitant to just blindly let him take me somewhere, but he seemed really confident that he knew where Percy was hiding. I wasn't sure _how_ he knew though. He didn't even give me time to swallow my food before he popped us out of the hotel room.

I stumbled a little when we arrived at our destination, but Malfoy held onto my arm to steady me.

"Why are we _here_?" I asked him disbelievingly as I caught sight of the building that had appeared across the road from us.

"Well, he's a Weasley, so he's poor, and I'm pretty sure he has some sort of strange fetish for paperwork and rules. This place is cheap _and_ boring, it suits him perfectly," he told me with conviction; he really believed that we were going to find Percy in there.

"Malfoy... What is Muggle Land?" I asked, not quite sure I wanted to know the answer.

"According to the brochure they sent out in the mail, it's a place where you can get the authentic muggle experience without the muggle contamination. Their packages come complete with a tedious, soul crushing desk jobs..." He trailed off when he saw the look I was giving him.

"What?" He asked defensively. "I wanted to read the pamphlet before I burned it in disgust." Sure he did, my bet was that he had considered going there out of sheer curiosity, and possibly boredom.

He was going to insist he was right until he was proven wrong, possibly even then, so we might as well get this searching the place thing over with. "Let's go," I sighed, leading the way towards the entrance – this was bound to be interesting.

"You can't go as you," I remembered at the last second; I doubted they were desperate enough to put up posters that he was wanted yet, but with the luck we were having we'd run into an auror who knew Malfoy was on the loose, or someone would remember seeing his distinctive blonde hair and mention it in the presence of someone who knew he was missing.

He quickly jumped several steps back from me glaring threateningly. "Don't even _think_ about putting mud in my hair again," he warned me.

"I wouldn't dream of it," I told him honestly – if I was dreaming, something much more painful would be happening to him.

"Well then how are we going to disguise me?" He asked. My only answer was an evil grin; I had an idea.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

**A/N: For the sake of this chapter, Hermione can still see Malfoy because she cast the spell. It seems I'm not capable of writing a story without a disguise in it at some point... My newest one (Not Quite a Fairytale, coming soon) has a disguise in it, and so does A Tail Changes Everything...**

**This chapter puts me over 70 000 words archived here! That's quite exciting... I'm still obsessed with the stats pages; I just have a lot less time to look at them, which is sad because they're **_**fascinating**_**. **

**~Frosty**

"_Well then how are we going to disguise me?" He asked. My only answer was an evil grin; I had an idea, but he wasn't going to like it._

He stared backing away further when he was my evil grin. "On second thought, I'm positive he's not here. He's probably somewhere nice and far from anywhere anyone would ever go, far from anyone who could possibly recognise me."

I just continued grinning; poor, suspicious Malfoy, it seemed almost like he had no faith in me – that or he was worried how I would go about disguising him. And here I was having been nothing but helpful...

I cast the spell I had been planning and watched as Malfoy cringed away from me and tried to escape. I sighed, "Calm down, I just disillusioned you," I told him.

He stopped his cringing and looked down at himself. "Oh. Let's go then," he said, leading the way towards the entrance. I rolled my eyes towards the sky and followed him; someone had to make sure he didn't do something stupid like open the door while no one could see him, it would arouse suspicion.

I speed walked past him, giving him a bit of a shove for making me put in the extra effort as I passed – and he would most likely earn it in the near future but I wouldn't be able to do it with people watching.

Once we were inside, I hesitantly walked up to the front counter, a little weary of the decorating scheme in their front room; it looked like Disneyland had thrown up and then an office decorator had tried to make it look corporate. "I'd like a day pass please," I told the woman behind the counter.

She smiled vacantly at me and handed me a ticket, along with a map of the building and its many levels. It looked like out back it was some sort of theme park, but in the front it was a hotel/huge business type thing, presumably so people could 'work' as well as stay in a genuine muggle hotel.

I held the map slightly off to the side so that Malfoy could read it over my shoulder without me looking mental. "Are you thinking he's trying out the 'soul crushing, tedious desk job' as well?" I asked out of the corner of my mouth, glancing quickly at him.

Malfoy nodded. "Except I'm not sure he has a soul in him, he always did seem a little vacant." I frowned at him but ignored him; my bet was that he didn't even know which of the older Weasleys we were looking for. Sure he knew the name, but put all three together and he would probably be clueless despite their drastically different looks.

We headed off to the building that housed the cubicles that wizards actually _paid_ to sit in – some of these purebloods were pretty mixed up, and they thought the muggles were the ones being odd.

The office building they had in their parody of an amusement park wasn't actually that abnormal looking, considering what the hotel had looked like. I could actually picture normal muggles coming here to work on a daily basis.

No one had any objections to a stranger walking in – this wasn't a _real_ workplace after all – so we just walked right through the first floor of cubicles and made our way to the elevator. A helpful little sign was posted telling us that the 'muggle workplace simulator' was on the fifth floor. If Percy Weasley was in this place, it would be there – hell, he's probably in charge of the place by now if he'd been here the whole time he was missing.

Malfoy followed me into the elevator and we waited while the 'authentic muggle elevator music' played in the small space. I scowled up at the speaker in the ceiling; there were some things that really weren't needed from the muggle world, elevator music being one of them.

The elevator ignored my scowl and dinged cheerily as we reached our destination. This floor looked so... normal compared to the portion of this theme park I had already seen. The whole place was a maze of cubicles and there were offices along the far wall, it was all painted in shades of beige with the occasional motivational poster on the walls as if that would brighten up the oppressively uniform colours in the place.

Not one of the people looked up at me as I exited the elevator, so I just walked towards the offices at the back; if Percy wasn't in one of them, whoever was should be able to tell me if Percy was here.

"Granger, look," Malfoy said, grabbing my arm to stop me. I tried to glare at him without looking like I was glaring while at the same time attempting to see what it was he'd stopped me for. I was more successful with the latter; just entering one of the offices was a flash of red hair followed by blond. What was Lucius Malfoy doing here with Percy? Even more shocking was that Malfoy had been right about guessing Percy was here...

"Holy crap..." I said quietly, but not quietly enough; Malfoy was standing beside me looking both smug and worried at the same time.

"I _told_ you this is where the Weasley would be, it's just the right amount of horrifying and cheap for him to find enjoyable. My father's presence is a little worrying though. Where are you going?" He demanded in a whisper when I started to walk away during his little gloating session.

"I'm going to find out what they're talking about," I told him quietly, glancing around to see if anyone noticed I was talking to thin air.

"And how do you propose we do that? They've probably locked the door and cast a silencing spell on the room."

For someone who spoke like he knew everything, there was a whole lot that he didn't know. I discreetly pointed up the one of the cameras and nodded towards the office in the far corner labelled 'security'. Malfoy still looked confused, but didn't dare ask about it; people were starting to notice me standing there and were glancing up curiously from their work or games of solitaire or whatever they were doing at the ancient computers on their desks.

I strode confidently over to the security door, opened it, and walked in, all without any hesitation – if you look like you know where you're going and what you're doing, people assume you're supposed to be there and don't question it. Malfoy followed me in and looked around with a frown. "Granger, how will this stuff help us?" He demanded, indicating the only thing in the room, a bank of monitors.

I ignored him, instead examining said bank of monitors. There was a keyboard and a mouse hooked up to them, so it was obviously some sort of computer system, I just had to get it to show me the right room. My eyebrows drew together in a frown as I started hitting buttons experimentally, the person who had set this up was a little too enthusiastic with their electronics; they'd installed something way more complicated than a place like this should ever need _and_ they'd installed the cameras with sound, which was very convenient for us - if I could just get them to show us the room we wanted to see.

"Ah hah!" I exclaimed triumphantly as I finally got the thing working the way I wanted it to; all the monitors were now showing an angry Lucius holding his wand to Percy's forehead.

"I thought you said Draco would be out of our way for a long time and we were in the clear," he hissed menacingly. My eyebrows rose as I took in the scene we were witnessing. They were working together? They were supposed to _hate_ each other.

"Mr. Malfoy, listen to me!" Percy said as he edged away from the tip of the wand pointed at him. "Just because Draco's escaped doesn't mean we're going to get caught. The money we've taken is long gone and the ministry has no way to connect it to us, so we're still safe."

We watched as Lucius took a step back from the redhead and scowled. "They better not connect this to me, you have no _idea_ what it would do to my reputation if people found out I was in trouble financially!" He snapped before storming out of the room.

Percy slid down a wall and sat on the floor, resting his head in his hands; apparently he'd been more terrified of Lucius than he's let on.

I glanced over at Malfoy behind me; he looked like he was ready to stab someone, but was torn between choosing his father or Percy as his first victim.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

**A/N: I've been BUSY! Classes and readings and everything. Turns out, if you're an English major, they want you to READ a LOT. Go figure. I'm actually behind in my readings and it's only the second week, it's not really my fault though, the university bookstore never ordered the books I needed for my course, so I had to order them on Chapters . ca and they're NOT HERE YET! Gah. Rant finished.**

**Okay, I wrote that ^ rant a couple days ago intending to post the chapter, but it wasn't right so I left it awhile. *update*: The books were on the porch for a couple days, I was checking the mailbox for the little delivery notification cards I'm used to when I was actually walking past them to check the mailbox. *blushes* In my defence, the mailman hid them behind the garbage can.**

**~Frosty**

_Last chapter:_

_I glanced over at Malfoy behind me; he looked like he was ready to stab someone, but was torn between choosing his father or Percy as his first victim._

"They were in on this against me!" he shouted. I looked worriedly towards the door, casting a silencing charm just in case someone overheard and got it in their head to check up on me.

"With me imprisoned, father has control over my personal fortune. He was probably using it to rebuild his own," Malfoy said angrily. I didn't answer because it seemed like he was trying to figure something out by talking it through, not actually wanting my input.

I left him to his thoughts while I tried to figure out this evil machine – spending ten months a year for the majority of my childhood at a boarding school without any technology more advanced than a flushing toilet didn't exactly make a girl technologically savvy.

"Granger, what are you doing _now_?" He asked once he snapped out of his own little world.

"This thing is recording everything it sees. I'm trying to get a copy so we have proof of what they did," I told him. Sure, we could just get a pensive, but any good lawyer could just claim we'd tampered with the memory. We could also just submit to Veritaserum, but that was nasty stuff and it could be wrong as well if the person actually believed the lie they were telling.

"And what is it we're going to do with this proof?" He asked; it seemed he was worried that I was going to turn him in. His lack of trust in me was a little bit irritating – I'd been dealing with his annoying presence this long, why would I get rid of him _now_ when he was almost cleared and I could be rid of him without my stupid conscience nagging me about abandoning him when he needed help. I didn't answer his question; it was really better that he didn't know ahead of time, it would save me a headache.

The evil machine finally spit out the disk with the video on it just as someone rattled the doorknob, I took the silencing spell off the room. "Is everything all right in there?" they asked. Crap. They must have heard Malfoy's little outburst before the silencing spell.

I grabbed his arm and the disk before apparating us out of there.

"We're in Potter's house _again_!" Malfoy demanded in a hiss, as he had some sort of panicky episode.

"Harry!" I shouted, watching in amusement as Malfoy tried to hide himself behind the curtains. "You don't have to hide in there," I told him as Harry rushed into the room and hugged me.

"Hermione! Are you all right? What's been going on with you?" He demanded, taking my shoulders and holding me at arms distance as if I was going to run away or something.

"Harry, I need you to listen to me and not freak out. Can you do that?" I asked him slowly; if he hexed Malfoy the second he saw him, I was going to have to listen to Malfoy's complaints for the rest of the day. Harry looked at me oddly, but nodded slowly – he was such a good friend, always willing to trust me even when something bad usually happened after someone tells you not to freak out.

"Who's behind the curtain?" Harry asked curiously as he caught sight of the feet poking out from underneath them.

"That's part of what you're not freaking out about," I told him, hoping he'd remember that he'd _just_ said he wouldn't freak out.

"Hermione, there's someone hiding in the _curtains_," he said again slowly as if I hadn't heard him the first time.

"I know Harry, ignore him and sit down, you have to see something," I told him as I directed him over to the couch in front of the television. I fiddled with the remote and the television for a minute until I had it all sorted out and then I stuck the DVD I had taken from the security cameras into the player.

I turned to find Harry not even looking at what I was doing, he was preoccupied with Malfoy. "Hermione, I'd _really_ like to know who you have hiding in the curtains," Harry said.

I rolled my eyes; he _obviously_ didn't grasp the importance of what I was trying to show him. "Harry, just watch the video!" I snapped as I pressed the play button. He gave a last look at the curtains but reluctantly turned to watch the television.

I watched as he was immediately riveted by the scene playing out on the screen in front of him. "Hermione," he said worriedly when the short video was done. "Where did you get this tape?"

"Muggle Land," I told him, not managing to hide my distaste for the place when I spoke about it. There was a small snicker from the curtains despite the delicate situation said curtain dweller was currently skirting around.

Harry's eyebrows disappeared into his hair. "Lucius Malfoy was at a place called muggle land?" He asked disbelievingly.

"Not the point!" I snapped. Between Harry, Ron and Malfoy, it was like I was working with a bunch of five year olds! "What we need to be focusing on the fact that Lucius Malfoy and Percy Weasley have been taking money from the ministry and pushed the blame off onto Draco! This is the case I've been working on as an unspeakable, but I can't actually make arrests, I need an auror for that."

Harry switched into auror mode and skipped the DVD back to the starting so he could watch it again now that he knew what was going on. _Finally_ I was dealing with an adult!

"I'm no lawyer, but I'm not sure muggle technology will work in a wizarding court," Harry said reluctantly, earning a groan from the curtains.

"Hermione," Harry started hesitantly, not sure he going to like the answer. "Who. Is. Behind. The. Curtains?" He demanded.

"Draco Malfoy," I told him honestly, there was only so much dodging around a subject you could do when he kept _shuffling_ in an obvious hiding place. I glared in Malfoy's direction, he was supposed to be a stealthy Slytherin, so what in the world was going _on_ over there?

I watched as Harry seemed frozen in shock and Malfoy hesitantly peeked out from his hiding spot.

"You better not arrest me Potter, I'm innocent," Malfoy announced as he dramatically whipped the curtain away from him.

Harry whipped his wand out and aimed it at Malfoy while turning to me. "You brought _Malfoy_ into my _house_?" He demanded angrily.

"Actually this is the second time I've been in here. I have to say, I really don't like what you've done with the place. I mean, if you're going to strut around calling yourself the saviour of the wizarding world, you should at least be able to afford a decent designer," Malfoy sneered. I cast a quick silencing at him and glared.

"Not. Helping!" I hissed at him. Where was his sense of self preservation? It was probably hiding underneath his snarky personality and giant ego. It was really a wonder he had survived this long as a Slytherin, unless there was just something about Harry that brought out his inner death wish.

I watched as Harry took a deep breath in order to calm himself down before he spoke again. "I'm not going to ask why he was in my house the first time, I think it's best for all of us if I just pretend I didn't hear that. I _do_ want to know why he's here now," Harry said as he visibly controlled himself from maiming his surprise guest. Before I could answer, he turned to Malfoy. "Despite your lack of tact Malfoy, I'm not going to arrest you. I _am_ going to help you sort out this mess, because Hermione seems to have some sort of unexplained soft spot for you –"

I interrupted him with a sputter, what in the world was he talking about? I did _not_ have a soft spot for Draco Malfoy!

"Don't give me that look Hermione, he was a complete arse a minute ago and all you did was silence him," Harry told me. I sputtered some more but I couldn't really argue... He _was_ an arse. "Now, as I was _saying_, let's catch the real culprits."

"And how are we going to do that?" I asked him. We both watched as Malfoy waved his hands around and pointed to his throat.

"I think he might have an idea," Harry told me; as if I hadn't already figured that out. The real question was whether he was going to be able to tell us the plan without getting himself arrested or insulting either of us to the point where we hexed him. I figured I could only do so much for him, and if he was to something moronic at this point, then it would be his own fault, so I took the silencing spell off of him and we looked at him expectantly, waiting for his suggestion.

He seemed to be basking in the attention he was getting from us - after so long alone on his island and then with only me to keep him company, an audience of two was a big thing. He cleared his throat dramatically and checked to see if we were still paying attention. I quickly grew frustrated and motioned him to hurry it up already.

"We set a trap," he declared proudly, glaring at me for ruining the dramatic pause he had been going for.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

**A/N:Thanks to everyone who reviewed, etc! I don't always remember to thank you guys... But you're great! This is officially the second last chapter of this story; I've finished it! This chapter's a bit longer than the average for this story and the next one's quite a bit longer.**

**A note for this chapter: I've never actually stayed in a hotel... So a lot of this was based on internet searches. If I made any glaring omissions or mistakes, tell me. **

**~Frosty**

_Last chapter:_

"_We set a trap," he declared proudly, glaring at me for ruining the dramatic pause he had been going for._

"That's actually not a bad idea, Malfoy. Do you have any thoughts on how we're going to do that?" Harry asked him, sounding as surprised that he was agreeing with Malfoy as Malfoy looked upon receiving what was almost a compliment from Harry.

"We get the auror at the ministry Lucius has corrupted to send Lucius a note saying that they've found Malfoy in a muggle hotel in London. When Lucius goes there to get rid of him, we strike," I said.

Harry nodded approvingly. "That should work, I think I know who their spy is; I'll deal with that part, you two deal with the rest of it. Can you handle Malfoy until then?" He asked me; seemingly a little worried that Malfoy was going to try and kill me in my sleep or something – I was still a muggleborn and Malfoy was still a Malfoy, after all. Not that I couldn't handle him _or_ his father.

Harry got into the fireplace and went to the ministry to deal with the auror, sped along by the death glare I was sending his way at the mere suggestion that I couldn't deal with Malfoy. He was supposed to be my friend, and as my friend, he was supposed to have confidence in me.

"You came up with that plan just to get me into another muggle motel, didn't you?" Malfoy demanded, probably angry that he would have to stay in another muggle hotel when he was so disturbed by the last one. Truthfully, it _had_ been the inspiration behind my idea.

I grinned at him. "That was part of my motivation, but it really is a good plan. Besides, the ministry isn't going to be looking for you anymore, so you can use your money again and get us into an expensive hotel if you don't want to go somewhere cheaper to save money." It really was fun to mess with him.

I walked over to the table holding the phone and rifled through the stacks of papers that were piled underneath it. The hotel section offered many options; I scanned through the list and chose one located on a street I knew to be full of high class hotels and over priced restaurants.

Malfoy had been watching me, obviously wondering what I was doing. "Granger, I seriously doubt a book is going to help us right now," he told me. I frowned at him; there was almost _never_ a time when a book wasn't going to help. I wasn't going to tell him that though, it would most likely just lead to him laughing at me.

"It _is_ going to help. _These_ are all of the hotels in the area. Pick one," I told him, pointing to the entries listed on the page.

Something occurred to me. "Your Gringotts account has a muggle bank account connected to it doesn't it?" I asked him, remembering that if he was going to pay for it, we would need his money. Gringotts had arranged an agreement with a muggle bank owned by a squib that allowed wizards to spend money in the muggle world and then have it converted and taken out of their accounts; it was sort of like a credit card for wizards, actual cards were even available for ease of access.

"How do I tell which are the ones that won't leave lasting mental trauma?" He asked, looking confused as he read over the listings. I directed his attention to the ones I knew to be in the expensive area and left him to pick one.

He debated them for a second before randomly selecting one and looking at me expectantly. I rolled my eyes and picked up the phone. I made a reservation for two adjoining rooms with a view and all the fun added features I would never bother with if I was spending my own money.

"Somehow I doubt you would ever spend that much on a room if you weren't spending my money," Malfoy drawled as he put his feet up on Harry's coffee table – Ginny would murder him if she came in and saw that.

"You're so generous," I told him with a very fake smile, motioning for him to come stand beside me so we could apparate to the apparition point closest to the hotel. I suddenly remembered that Harry needed to know where we were going to be so I quickly scribbled a note and left it on the kitchen table where he was sure to see it the second he came in the door.

"Okay, let's go," I said to Malfoy, grabbing his arm and apparating us a block away from our hotel. Malfoy seemed like he was more used to the traffic this time, so he wasn't as on edge during the short walk.

"This is more like it," Malfoy said, looking approvingly at the outside of the building. Everything was so _shiny_ and spotless here, and none of the staff looked at all surly. In fact, they all had fake smiles on their faces, it was actually kind of disturbing really - they must have someone scary for a manager.

"We have a reservation," I told the man at the front desk, matching his fake smile with one of my own. He handed me a key and told me to 'have a nice stay' and some other crap that they were forced to spit out at every guest staying here.

I was the one who swiped the card key, Malfoy insisted that he wanted to see someone do it properly so he could learn from example, but I was pretty sure he just wanted to make sure the muggle technology he didn't trust wasn't going to hurt me – essentially, he was using me as a guinea pig. I might have been annoyed if I wasn't sure I was safe and about to stay in a hotel room I would never be able to afford with him footing the bill.

I unlocked his room and then moved to the door to the adjoining room and went into my own to investigate. I would never pay the huge bill this room came with, but I had to admit it was completely worth the money if you had the extra income floating around.

I was contemplating a bath in the Jacuzzi tub in the bathroom when a knock on the door in between the two rooms brought me out. "What?" I asked rudely, not wanting to be disturbed; this was the first bit of alone time I was going to get in a long time and I wanted to enjoy it!

"What exactly are we supposed to _do_ here?" He asked.

"We wait. We can't do anything until you father tries to come find you, so we just have to relax in this luxurious hotel and wait for him," I told him as I tried to edge the door shut.

True to his contrary nature, the git managed to get his foot in the door to stop it from shutting. From there it was a simple task for him to overpower me and force his way into my room. "What do you want Malfoy?" I snapped at him.

"I'm paying for this room as well, I figured I should get to at least see it before you lock me into that other room," he informed me as me opened the mini bar in the corner.

I made a frustrated growl and ignored him, making my way to the bathroom so I could have my bath. There was a free bathrobe provided with the room and fluffy towels, so I shut the bathroom door on Malfoy and drew myself a bath with lots of relaxing lavender bath salts, helpfully provided by the hotel.

I could vaguely hear a shuffling sound from the other side of the bathroom door, but I hadn't taken any personal belongings with me to the hotel that weren't currently in the bathroom and in my sight, so I wasn't concerned with him rifling through my stuff. He was probably just snooping around to satisfy some deep-seated Slytherin impulse to snoop around and invade the privacy of others – this impulse most likely developed as an instinctual defence mechanism against the other members of the Slytherin house. Forget survival of the fittest; in that house, it was survival of the one with the most blackmail material.

When the tub was finally filled – the downfall of the huge tubs was that they take _forever_ to fill – I lowered myself into it and let out a sigh. I made a mental note to find out where they got those bath salts and get some for home; they really did relax me more than a bath in plain hot water would have.

"Granger!" Malfoy called through the door. I watched as his shadow moved to the crack below the door and stopped.

"What?" I asked without my normal bite – it seemed that the less on edge I was, the more I could tolerate Malfoy.

"What's a 'Kit Kat'?" He asked me, followed by the crinkling sound of a candy bar wrapper.

"It's delicious, just eat it." He didn't say anything, but he also didn't move away from the door. I smiled when I heard the wrapper crinkling again and then, after a pause, crunching – it seemed that he had actually listened to me.

"I'm never drinking again if it's going to cause this much trouble. Why can't I be like normal people and just throw up for a while and wake up feeling like death the next day?" I muttered as I climbed out of the tub. I had been dragged across London and who knows where else by these insane purebloods and all their plots against the Malfoys.

"Because you're a Gryffindor, you're an attention whore by nature," Malfoy called through the door in a tone that told me the answer should have been obvious. I took a deep breath and reminded myself that it was in his nature to make snide remarks like that.

Instead of getting angry with him and engaging in the verbal sparring match he obviously wanted, I took a minute to contemplate the irony of calling someone an attention whore when the only reason he bothered voicing the statement was for attention. Yes, that was much more entertaining than whatever he had intended to start with his statement.

"Granger?" He tried when the silence stretched long enough that he knew I wasn't going to answer him.

I finished drying off and put the robe on, casting a quick scourgify on my clothes so I wouldn't be putting dirty clothes on my clean body. Instead of answering him, I just pulled open the door, causing him to stumble into the bathroom and fall on the floor – it seemed that he had been leaning on it.

"Stop trying to start arguments just because you're bored and get ready for an attack," I told him as I stepped over him. Nothing would happen for a few more hours at _least_ – Lucius needed to get word that his son was here before he could come looking for him - but being over prepared was preferable to dead any day.

"I always knew you were soft, but I never thought you'd let mudbloods literally walk all over you boy," an annoyed sounding voice said. I glanced up to see Lucius Malfoy standing in the conjoining doorway between our two rooms. _This_ is what I meant about the prepared – it would do me some good to take my own advice sometimes; my wand was still sitting on the counter beside the sink.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

**A/N: I've never written an action scene before, so this is my first attempt. This is also the last chapter. Thanks to everyone who reviewed, etc! I'll be posting one of the four stories I've started soon, so keep an eye out for it!**

**I **_**was**_** going to wait to post this, but I was excited to have three completed stories... And I've never been one for patience anyway. Enjoy!**

**~Frosty**

"_I always knew you were soft, but I never thought you'd let mudbloods literally walk all over you boy," an annoyed sounding voice said. I glanced up to see Lucius Malfoy standing in the conjoining doorway between our two rooms. This is what I meant about the prepared – it would do me some good to take my own advice sometimes; my wand was still sitting on the counter beside the sink._

Malfoy immediately grabbed my knees and pulled me down on top of him, just in time for the curse Lucius had thrown at me to miss and take a good chunk out of the wall. I dove off of him and threw myself in the direction of my wand, ducking as another curse made the bidet explode – it was no huge loss, those things always disturbed me a little anyway.

My wand was sitting right where I had stupidly left it; I scowled at it as I snatched it up – how could I have been so stupid to just _leave_ it there?

Wand safely in my grasp, I whipped around to jump back into the fray and all that Gryffindor stuff. Lucius seemed determined to destroy the entire room when I peeked around the doorway. It seemed that I was out of sight and mind at the moment, so I used the opportunity to edge behind him while he was distracted trying to murder his son.

Malfoy was doing a surprisingly good job duelling his father; it appeared that he had improved significantly since I had last seen him in action. I watched in horror as Lucius gained the upper hand and managed to hit his son with a particularly nasty curse that cut deeply into Malfoy's wand arm, causing a considerably large amount of blood to spray the wall behind him. These action things were a lot scarier than I remembered - probably because when you're seventeen you're still invincible, it's only later in life that you realize how fragile you really are in your mortality.

"You always were too soft," he snarled at his wounded son as he advanced menacingly towards him to finish him off.

I finally managed to get in position behind Lucius, raising my wand to strike. Malfoy's eyes flicked to me and then back to his father in an involuntary reaction as he noticed me standing there.

Unfortunatly for me, Lucius also noticed this eye movement and whipped around to face me, flinging a curse before I could react. I was less lucky than Malfoy, and the same curse that had injured him ripped across my chest, cutting deeply and causing me to fall to the ground in agonizing pain.

I lost track of what was happening after that, but I was in too much pain to be overly concerned with my surroundings. Someone shouted Avada Kedavera, but the two men in the room had similar voices and it was impossible for me to discern which one of them was the one that had survived. Unless the unforgiveable had missed... I was in too much pain to think of all the possible outcomes; if someone came to kill me, then Malfoy was dead; if someone came to see if I was alive, then his father was dead.

"Granger? Are you all right?" Ah, it must be Lucius that was dead. Good. I'd never liked the snobby bastard; he'd had it coming for a while.

"Granger?" Malfoy said again, starting to sound concerned, which was probably a good thing; the edges of my vision were starting to go dark.

"Hermione, don't you _dare_ die," he tried. Had I been in a right state of mind, I might have been surprised that he'd deigned to use my first name. As it was, I just blinked a few times; maybe he knew Morse code – even if he didn't, my eyelids were the only thing I seemed able to move. I felt someone lift me up before everything went black.

* * *

When I woke up, Harry and Ginny's faces were all I could see. I loved them and all, but sometimes a girl needs her personal space. "Why're you hovering?" I mumbled, surprised when my voice came out small and scratchy like I hadn't used it in a long time.

"You've been unconscious for _days_. What were you thinking taking on Lucius Malfoy?" Ginny demanded. I was tempted to remind her that her husband had taken on Voldemort when he was much younger, but she already knew that – scolding was one of the ways she showed he worry, so I tuned her out and left her to it.

While she was lecturing me about irresponsibility and not waiting for a squad of aurors as backup before acting, I looked over at Harry sitting beside her. "What happened?" I asked him, interrupting Ginny.

"Percy Weasley happened. He paid me a visit at home, hoping I could protect him from Lucius, but I wasn't home so he snooped. He found the video and he found the hotel you circled in the phonebook so I would know where you were. He put them together and thought that notifying Lucius of Draco's location would get him back into his good books and keep him safe," Harry explained. Ginny was looking murderous.

"Don't worry, Percy's in Azkaban for a while for everything he's done and Lucius Malfoy is dead," she said. I took a minute to process all of this.

"How long have I been out?" I asked.

"Three days, we've been worried sick about you!" Ginny slapped me lightly on the knee as she informed me. "The mediwitch healed the cut, but they didn't know what curse Lucius had used, so it kept reopening, it was really dark magic, whatever he used."

I lifted up the scratchy sheet that was covering me and found a hospital gown, underneath that my chest was wound free. There was a barely visible scar where the pain had been the worst, so it must have been deepest there, but there was no lasting damage other than that. "If the mediwitch couldn't heal me, then how am I healed?" I asked.

"That was Malfoy. I've never seen him look that worried, he showed up at the ministry with you ghost pale and dripping blood everywhere, and then he refused to leave your side. When they couldn't heal you, he disappeared for a while and came back with a scary looking book and he fixed you," Harry said. A scary looking book? He must have gone home and found the counter curse for me.

"Was he all right?" I asked, a little bit worried about the blond nuisance.

"He was fine, they were able to heal him because he was only grazed by the curse; you were hit dead on." I breathed a sigh of relief; everything had turned out all right then.

"He hasn't come to visit me, has he?" I asked, doing my best not to blush. We'd been through quite a lot together, it would be kind of rude of him if he didn't even come to thank me for everything I'd done.

"He actually kind of disappeared after he knew you were going to be okay, no one's seen him since. The ministry's been looking for him, they want to give him a medal for his bravery against his father," Harry said, looking conflicted about the ministry having anything good to say about a Malfoy.

Huh. That was strange; why would he just disappear? I made a mental not to find him once I was out of the hospital, it seemed that I needed to thank him for saving my life.

* * *

My attempts to find Malfoy had been unsuccessful. Considering his fondness for attention, you'd think it would be easy to find the wizard. I was down to the last place on the short list of places I thought he might be: Blaise's house. I knocked on the door and entered when someone from inside called that the door was open.

"Um, Luna? Zabini? What are you two doing?" I asked as I walked into the room, not sure I really wanted the answer.

"We're filing, why do you ask?" Luna said dreamily. I watched her chase down the paper ducks, unfold them, and carefully file them away in orderly folders while Zabini pulled up the paper lily pads and did the same – come to think of it, the swamp did look considerably smaller than it had when I'd last been here. The two worked well together, I was pretty sure they lived in the same alternate reality.

"Okay... Well, Zabini, I'm looking for Malfoy, do you know where he is?" I asked him, wanting to get to the point and get out of there before I was roped into rounding up the ducklings or something.

He looked up at me from the swamp. "I haven't seen him. Don't worry though, he'll come see you when he's done whatever needed to be done," I blushed a little; who said I was looking for Malfoy because _I_ wanted to talk to him? It was possible I was trying to find him for the ministry...

"Thanks," I mumbled, turning around and leaving. That was that; Malfoy had disappeared and would have to come find _me_ if he wanted his thanks. I went home annoyed; when I went looking for answers, I liked to _find_ them!

I almost had a heart attack when I came back home to find the prat sitting on my couch. "Where have _you_ been hiding?" I asked him, looking him up and down, he didn't seem to be deathly ill or anything, so why had he been hiding from everyone?

"I haven't been hiding, I've been hunting. I wanted to know why and how the hell Pansy was involved in this whole mess; she was the only part that didn't really make sense, so I went to find her and hunt down some answers." I waited for him to elaborate, but it seemed he was done with his explanation. That didn't actually tell me anything; it just made me more curious!

"And?" I prompted.

"And she never intended for either of us to actually use the portkey she slipped you; she wanted you to be caught carrying it and have you charged with helping me escape and have me charged with trying to escape."

"Why would she want to do that? I thought she was your friend?"

Malfoy curled his lip with contempt. "She wasn't my friend, she was my fiancé, our parents arranged our marriage when we were toddlers and she's been practically stalking me ever since. I'd been looking for an excuse to break the engagement since I was told it existed, and being arrested allowed me to do that; there was a clause in the contract that allowed a cancellation of the contract in the event that either party was arrested." I nodded; that made sense. I was a little surprised that he was being so free with all of this information, but I wasn't going to question it; I always did love getting answers.

The silence as I processed this new information started to stretch into awkward territory, so I asked him something I had been wondering since I walked in to find him in my living room. "Malfoy, what are you doing here?"

"Thin line between love and hate and all that shite," he muttered, facing away from me like he didn't actually want me to hear it but had to say it. Wait. What _was_ he saying? Because I really didn't think he was trying to confess his secret love for me.

I raised a skeptical eyebrow at the blond. "Are you saying you love me?"

"No! I'm just saying that maybe I don't hate you as much as I did before." Well _that_ just cleared everything up nicely; the man was a regular wordsmith.

It suddenly occurred to me that he was starting to get a little close for a normal conversation. "What are you doing?" I asked him wearily as I took a step back to put him at a more comfortable distance.

He didn't answer me, just continued to advance until I was trapped against the wall and he had an arm on either side of my head, keeping me there. I knew then that wherever this was headed, it probably wouldn't be good in the long run, but it would be a hell of a lot of fun on the way to no good.

He confirmed my suspicions on both accounts when he closed the rest of the distance between us, pressing me against the wall as he kissed me. I was still a little stunned when he pulled away and took a step back.

"Come talk to me when the divorce goes through," he told me, turning and leaving before I could get over my surprise and form a coherent thought after that kiss.

When I could think again, my first thought was: 'I have to catch him'. I shook my head to clear it – why couldn't anything be easy with him? But maybe that was what made it fun.

A grin spread across my face, if only Ron could see me now. I made a split second decision and ran out of the door after Malfoy.

He was just getting to the apparition point around the block from my flat when I caught up to him. I grabbed his arm and turned him around to face me. "The divorce was finalised last week," I told him. A slow smirk made its way onto his face.

"In that case, I have a Gryffindor to corrupt."


End file.
